If you are looking to hold a bearded dragon as a pet for the first time, you might not even know what it is that they eat. Considering
how vital the right diet for any living being that is something you
need to thoroughly understand before you bring your new friend home from
the herp store. Beardies are omnivores like humans, meaning they eat both plants and other organisms.
A
good diet for a bearded dragon is similar to what is a good diet for a
human being (should anyway): for the most part they eat salads dark,
leafy greens (romaine, green leaf, red leaf, green cabbage) and also
orange and yellow vegetables (carrots and pumpkin are what I use) with occasional feedings of crickets and worms in a calcium / vitamin supplement dusted.
Baby beardies a diet of crickets are given only at the pet store in the rule so that they actually need to be trained to eat vegetables. This takes time, patience and dedication, and is of utmost importance. Most beardies catch on within a couple of days, but if yours does not, you have to stick to it. Failure to do so could literally kill your pet. I know because it did me. Beardies get sick and die only given a diet of insects.
The best way to train babies to eat their vegetables, this is:
Wait an hour or two past the typical feeding your beardie is so good and hungry.
Prepare a shallow bowl full of a very finely ground dark green like romaine or green leaf, and some chopped peelings from carrots and yellow squash. Moisten thoroughly, but they do not completely drown. (A spray bottle on the "mist" setting is good for this.)
Position your beardie (. If he does not come to investigate when it in his enclosure) next to the bowl if you would like to offer him a small piece of the greens by hand - hopefully he will mind and maybe even lick it.
Take one baby cricket, which he used to eat, and place it in the bowl before the beardie where he can see clearly.
Ideally, he will lunge for the cricket fully extended with his tongue, and in the process inadvertently a big gulp of vegetables. After he ate the cricket, wait and see if he keeps the vegetables or even to ignore.
Repeat consistently for all subsequent feedings. After two or three days, the Greens offer alone and see how he talks to them. He should start slowly picking at them, at which time you offer him "wean" him to talk less and less of them as crickets, and eventually it will completely take over his salads for dinner.
This is the best way that I know of, a bearded dragon as the most nutritious vegetables that are critical to its survival and good health teach eat. It worked very well for my current beardie, Bu is who has more than six years old and still going strong.
